One way to fix a wonky shed
Entry posted by Ferdinand
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Like the best magazines, this article consists mainly of pictures - as it is nearly Bank Holiday weeking and I am heading off to a Camping Barn near @recoveringacademic's place with friends.
The problem is straightforward.
About 5 years ago on moving to the current house I had a 8' by 8' shed constructed in a corner of the garden which consisted of (perceived) well-packed rubble from many years ago. We used a base of concrete fence-posts laid flat to allow some minimal give, and room to expel any unwelcome undershed-dwellers, and to avoid the extra expense of a full concrete slab.
How wrong I was. The ground turned out to be as movable as a slow-motion mattress, probably due to the rubble not being as compacted as thought, heave from a nearby tree, and a succession of extreme summers. The thing seems to move by up to a couple of inches at one end or the other up or down depending on how the weather, the tree and the rubble are changing. And the shed has needed adjusting twice since it was put in, and it still looks wonky.
A further issue was a frame on the shed not quite strong enough to prevent shear distortion (ie the roof moving sideways relative to the base to give a rhombus shape.)
I decided to use a product from ASP Wallbarn called Adjustable Support Pads, in this case their Megapad product which supports 1500kg per pad, and which give nearly 4 inches of vertical movement on each pad. These were installed under the existing posts using a couple of trolley jacks and a bit of digging. The pads can be adjusted after installation. The cost for 8 pads delivered was just over £70.
If you order these or similar from online trade or retail sellers, then you may well be much more heavily clobbered by expensive shipping costs. I ordered these over the phone from Wallbarn, and they even reduced the £15 shipping cost to £7; the products arrived the next morning.
Total time taken was about 6 hours for one man.
This photo shows the full range of adjustment, and the component parts.
The shed as it was on Wednesday morning
Leaning to the Left.
Wedges and a door that has not been lockable for some time
Doing the job
Levelling Up
Correcting the shear, and installing a new brace
Job Done. I hope.
Will it work?
Ask me in a couple of years, when the ground has moved again.
Total cost was under £200. A new shed plus a concrete slab would have been about £1000 or a little more done professionally with careful sourcing.
The chap doing the work is the excellent John Smith of Little John Property Services (M: 07702 033296), who does a lot of property maintenance for me.
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